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THE SPIRITUAL DYNAMICS OF SOCIAL WORK 


By Hastines H. Hart, LL.D. 
Director Department of Child-Helping, Russell Sage Foundation 


Social science is becoming the greatest of the sciences. This 
follows of necessity from the rapid development of the solidarity 
of the social world. The earthquake in San Francisco shakes the 


financial centers of London and Berlin. The miseries of Mexico 


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afflict the citizens of the United States. The outbreak of the plague 
in Singapore turns the people of New Orleans into rat catchers. 
The roar of cannon in France awakens the echoes of exploding 
shrapnel in South Africa and Kiau Chau. The closing of the 
Dardanelles increases the price of bread in Chicago and Pekin. 
The fierce desperation of Germany not only destroys the lives of 
a million of her foes, but condemns a hundred innocent citizens 
of the United States to instant execution. The devastation of 
Belgium starts a beneficent golden stream of ten million dollars a 
month in America. St. Paul’s declaration applied to the Chris- 
tian church, ‘‘None of us liveth to himself, and none dieth to 
himself,’’ has today a world-wide application. 

As physical science materializes in corporations, transportation 
lines, and factories, so social science in its various branches develops 
concretely in associations, institutions, and public policies. Thus 
the science of theology is applied in the activities of churches, 
schools, missions, and Christian associations; the science of medi- 
cine is the foundation for hospitals, health departments, and pre- 
ventive medicine; the science of criminology has led to the remark- 
able developments of modern penology, and the science of psy- 
chology is rapidly revolutionizing public policies in the treatment 


, of the insane, the feeble-minded, and the delinquent. Social 


science reveals the sources and the causes of human ills; social 
workers apply that science not only to the immediate relief of 
suffering but to the development of individuals and families, and 
to practical efforts for the removal of the causes and the extirpation 
of pauperism, vice, and crime. 


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SOCIAL WORK DEFINED 


We are to discuss this morning social work. By this term is 
meant the associated effort of those who seek to promote justice 
and happiness in behalf of their fellow members of society. Sub- 
jectively, the distinctive mark of social work is the associated 
effort of all the forces of society which make for human welfare, 
working together; individuals, churches, schools, social settlements, 
charitable and philanthropic societies, government, all co-operating 
to the same end. 

Objectively, social work takes account of the fact that its objects 
are members of society and that their welfare is vitally associated 
with that of the whole community. To again enlarge the sig- 
nificance of one of St. Paul’s statements respecting the church: 
‘“Whether one member suffereth, all the members suffer with it.” 
The destructive effects of contagious diseases, intemperance, vice, 
or sloth can not be restricted to their victims alone; others inevi- 
tably suffer likewise. 


THE THESIS 


The purpose of this address is to declare and illustrate this thesis: 
The moving force and essence of all true social work is spiritual. 
No social work is worthy of the name which does not spring from 
a spiritual purpose and which does not terminate in a spiritual 
result. 

The word spiritual, in this address, is used to signify, in the 
words of the Standard Dictionary: ‘Pertaining to the soul or 
inner man; relating to or affecting the immaterial nature of man, 
especially that higher principle of man’s being which is distinguished 
from the animal soul.” 

The truth of this thesis will readily be conceded with reference 
to those social activities which are commonly known as religious 
work; the work of the church, the Sunday school, the young men’s 
Christian association, and the various temperance organizations. 
It will also be conceded, probably, that all forms of educational 
work are essentially spiritual; the theological seminary, the college, 
the academy, the military school, the vocational school, the public 
school. All forms of education call for leaders of consecration and 
unselfish devotion, and fail of their proper influence unless they 


5 


establish character in their pupils; unless they develop and con- 
firm the virtues of temperance, industry, integrity, courage, and 
altruism. 

But our thesis is not only true of religious and educational work, 
it is equally true of all other forms of social work; social settle- 
ments, good housing, public playgrounds, public health, social 
hygiene, charity, and correction. In all of these fields it is now 
recognized that we must have leaders who are not inspired by the 
desire for gain or prestige or promotion, but who are moved by the 
same spirit of consecration and devotion which we expect of the 
clergyman or the missionary, and that work in those lines as well 
as in religion and education is fruitless unless it produces an actual 
spiritual result. The entertainment of groups of young people 
in clubs and playgrounds has little value unless they are inspired 
to right thinking, fair play, good citizenship, and clean living. 
The compulsory cleanliness of the prison, the almshouse, or the 
tenement is of little use unless the individual can be inspired with 
the purpose not only of physical cleanliness but of moral cleanliness 
as well. Model tenements soon become nuisances unless their occu- 
pants learn to enjoy wholesome environment and better living. It 
is vain to feed the tramp or to replenish the pantry of the improvi- 
dent family unless they can be inspired with some measure of hope- 
fulness, self-respect, and exertion. It is worse than useless to 
confine the drunkard or the petty thief in prison for a few days or 
weeks, only to return him, unchanged, to the same environment 
from which he came. There must be developed in him the fixed 
purpose of reformation and the power to resist temptation. It is 
hopeless to undertake the cure of the insane if all of their surround- 
ings and their treatment are such as lead only to helplessness, leth- 
argy, and despair. 

I propose to illustrate and enforce our thesis from concrete 
examples of its actual application by society in its dealings with 
these three great classes, the dependent, the defective, and the 
delinquent members of society. Recognition of the spiritual ele- 
ment as the essence of social work has already made far-reaching 
changes in its forms and methods; but, at the outset, it must be 
distinctly understood that the application of this principle thus 
far is by no means universal. We still have many institutions 


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which are formal, mechanical, and materialistic; but in every form 
of social work there is actual progress in humanizing and spiritual- 
izing its operations; and it is this progress which we are to record. 

This new conception has already created new standards and 
has enlisted new types of men and women. Within my recollection 
it was thought that anyone would do to take charge of social 
work. The superintendency of almshouses, prisons, institutions 
for children, and such offices as superintendent of the poor or 
secretary of a child-helping society were refuges for people who 
needed a job; superannuated clergymen, worn-out school teachers, 
unsuccessful business men, and hungry politicians filled these 
responsible places. It is now becoming understood that we need 
for these places men and women who are competent, alert, trained, 
and conscientious. Agents of relief societies and superintendents 
of private institutions were often chosen because of their zeal and 
their general good intentions rather than for experience and prac- 
tical efficiency. Today we find in the list of social workers such 
people as Jane Addams, whose name has become a household word 
throughout the world; Julia Lathrop, who was chosen by President 
Taft and confirmed by President Wilson as chief of the Children’s 
Bureau at Washington, D. C.; Dr. Charles R. Henderson of the 
Chicago University, who laid down his life in efforts for the un- 
employed; Dr. Graham Taylor, the splendid head of the Chicago 
Commons and leader in Civic Reform in Chicago. It includes such 
men as Robert W. DeForest, President of the Charity Organization 
Society of New York, and Dr. Edward T. Devine, head of the New 
York School of Philanthropy. It includes such men as Thomas 
Mott Osborne, a gentleman and a scholar, who has accepted the 
wardenship of the notorious prison at Sing Sing and is devoting 
himself to the reconstruction of the prison system of New York; 
V. Everit Macy, a wealthy citizen of Westchester County, New 
York, who has accepted the position of county superintendent of 
the poor; and Dr. R. B. von Kleinsmid, professor of psychology in 
DePauw University, who accepted the subordinate position of dis- 
ciplinarian at the Indiana state reformatory but resigned after a 
year or two to become president of a state university. The speeches 
and writings of all of these people, as well as their labors, express 
and emphasize the spiritual quality of social work. | 


7 


A true institution is an organism. It grows, not by outward 
accretions but by an inward vital principle. It is animated and 
controlled by a living spirit which is peculiar to itself, which 
determines its character and measures its power. 

Money can not make a genuine institution. It may increase 
its resources and enlarge its opportunities, but it can create nothing. 


I THE DEPENDENT 


Let us now consider the practical application of the spiritual 
method to dependents. By dependents we mean people of normal 
mind who, because of age, disease, misfortune, or incompetency are 
unable to provide for themselves and are obliged to depend upon 
public or private aid. 

EARLY IDEALS SPIRITUAL 


The early ideals of the care of dependent people were spiritual. 
When people lived on farms and in villages, the problems of poverty 
and orphanage were met in a neighborly way. Everyone knew the 
situation and needs of his neighbors, and in case of distress the need 
was instantly and cheerfully met by those nearest at hand, and out 
of their own poverty they poured forth lavishly. When the need 
was beyond the resources of the individual neighbor, the church 
assumed the responsibility. The church built orphanages, hospitals, 
homes for the aged, and asylums for the insane, and the inspiration 
was spiritual. 

As society became complex, as cities were built, as neighbors 
ceased to know each other, as the well-to-do drew off into select 
groups and suburbs of their own and the poor began to inhabit 
tenement houses and slums, the spiritual method became less 
prevalent. Benevolent people organized relief societies, the public 
built almshouses and appointed poormasters. Officialism and 
party politics intruded upon the field of charity. Almshouses were 
purposely made forbidding to discourage the lazy and the vicious, 
and there old people who were victims of misfortune and disaster, 
worthless and idle vagabonds, little orphaned children, idiots and 
insane people, were herded together in misery. Children in orphan- 
ages were dressed in uniforms and meagerly fed, marched in long 
lines with shaven heads and listless mien, governed by perfunctory 
matrons and inefficient caretakers. 


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RETURN TO SPIRITUAL IDEALS 


About forty years ago there was an awakening of the public 
conscience under the lead of such women and men as Mrs. C. R. 
Lowell and Dorothea Dix, William P. Letchworth, Oscar Craig, 
Robert Treat Paine, Andrew Elmore, Frederick Howard Wines, 
and General Roeliff Brinkerhoff, which led to a new conception of 
the duty of the community toward the unfortunate. As a result 
there has been a gradual decline of the almshouse population in the 
United States. The insane have been removed to hospitals pre- 
pared for their especial care. The keeping of children in almshouses 
has been forbidden by law. Farm colonies are being established for 
able-bodied vagrants, and public employment agencies are being 
organized to provide opportunity for those who are able and willing 
to work. There is a growing disposition to admit to almshouses 
only those who are disabled by infirmity and then to provide for 
them as comfortably as circumstances will permit. Instead of 
county almshouses we have ‘‘county infirmaries”? in Ohio and 
‘“‘county asylums” in Indiana. The city of New York has provided 
on Staten Island comfortable and well-conducted cottages for old 
people who, after a life of industry, are obliged to accept a public 
refuge. 

PHILANTHROPIC SOCIETIES 

This beneficent principle is working even more efficiently in 
private agencies for dependents. Churches of different denomina- 
tions are establishing homes for the aged where decent people can 
be provided for in their old age without the necessity of going to a 
public almshouse. 

Relief societies no longer restrict their activities to doling out 
meager gratuities and old clothes. Such societies as the New York 
Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor and the St. 
Louis Provident Association are adopting constructive methods and 
are seeking to preserve and improve family life. 

Within the past thirty-five years there have grown up throughout 
the United States a multitude of charity organization societies or 
associated charities. They started with the motto, ‘‘Not alms but 
a friend.’’ They spend their efforts chiefly to help the poor to help 
themselves. They are working for improved housing, improved 
sanitary conditions, good milk, the establishment of public markets, 


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improved opportunities for recreation. They enlist volunteers as 
friendly visitors and endeavor to establish the human touch between 
the poor and those who seek to befriend them. They extend relief 
when necessary, but material relief is a secondary function. Their 
chief mission is to develop a spirit of courage, hopefulness, self- 
reliance, and self-help. 

SOCIAL SETTLEMENTS 


Side by side with the charity organization societies there have 
been developed the social settlements, in which large minded people 
of education establish their abode in the neglected sections of the 
great cities. Sometimes, like the members of South End House 
in Boston, they live in ordinary tenement houses; sometimes they 
live in one common building. But in either case they seek to share 
in the lives of those among whom they live and to promote good 
citizenship, civic spirit, education, artistic culture, wholesome rec- 
reation, good health, and happy domestic life. They build houses 
in which are established clubs for men and women, boys and girls; 
kindergartens; evening classes; gymnasia, and so forth. Some 
social settlements, lacking leadership, have failed to realize their 
purpose; but many of them have become a vital force in the com- 
munity for the promotion of the public welfare—centers for the 
fusion of foreign nationalities and for the promotion of patriotism 
and civic righteousness. One need only mention Chicago Commons 
and Hull House in Chicago; Henry Street Settlement, Greenwich 
House, and Waverley House in New York; South End House and 
Peabody House in Boston, to realize how far reaching the influence 
of social settlements has become. The great leaders in this move- 
ment have obtained a tremendous grip on the community because 
they deal intelligently with the vital elements of human life and 
human character. 

Thus far the social settlement idea has made but little progress in 
small cities and rural communities, though a few have been estab- 
lished and more are sure to follow. In my judgment the most useful 
and practical social settlement is the home of an educated, intelli- 
gent Christian family who, instead of removing to some favored 
suburb, voluntarily locate among the poor and there live a normal, 
wholesome, and happy life, neighboring with those about them and 
sharing with them their books, music, merriment, and good will, 


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and giving demonstrations in their daily home life of economical 
buying, good cooking, sensible dressing, artistic furnishing at small 
expense, and of the proper rearing and training of children. The 
influence for good of such a family in a poor district is incalculable. 

This idea is not theoretical, it has been carried out in multitudes 
of cases. I will mention two examples which have come under my 
personal observation. Mrs. Harris Barrett of Hampton, Virginia, 
established, years ago, such a social center in her own house. She 
and her husband, though possessed of very limited means, built on 
one end of their large lot a cottage in which are held mothers’ clubs, 
boys’ clubs, girls’ clubs, classes in art and domestic work, and social 
gatherings. On the same grounds the children of the neighborhood 
have play space and room for individual gardens. Miss Anna 
Jones, a public school principal in Kansas City, Missouri, has 
living in her own house a little group of teachers, a physician, and 
a nurse who have become a power for social betterment in the 
district in which they live. 


DEPENDENT CHILDREN 


The application of the spiritual principle has produced remarkable 
results for dependent children. For generations, the orphan asylum 
plan of dealing with the dependent child was the prevailing method 
in the United States. When a child was left homeless by the death 
or default of his natural protectors, it was thought that a substitute 
should be provided for the natural home and the idea prevailed that 
the substitute could be made better than the original article. Thus 
grew up the orphan asylum system of bringing up homeless children 
in institutions from infancy to young manhood and womanhood. 


THE ORPHAN ASYLUM SYSTEM 


A good argument can be made in favor of the orphan asylum sys- 
tem. It is said that in the ordinary home of poverty it is impossible 
for the child to have a fair chance. The home is insanitary, the 
food is insufficient, the parents are incompetent and in many cases 
vicious and cruel, the surroundings are demoralizing and the child 
is forced into undesirable associations. 

In a well-managed institution there can be maintained perfect 
sanitary conditions, good ventilation, suitable food, sufficient cloth- 
ing, and wholesome influences. If necessary, the child’s food can 


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be prescribed by a physician and weighed out for him at every 
meal. He is constantly under the influence of selected caretakers. 
He never plays truant, he never misses the evening.study hour, he 
never runs with the gang. His religious, moral, intellectual, and 
vocational instruction can be gauged to his needs with precision. 
Under these circumstances it is asked: ‘“‘ How can a good institution 
fail to produce a better product than the home of ignorance, vice, 
or intemperance?” 

The answer is, ‘‘Institutionalism.”’ Institution life is contrary to 
child nature. It is artificial and unnatural. The cooking is done by 
steam, the washing is done by steam, the house is heated by steam; 
the bell rings for the child to get up in the morning, for him to say 
his prayers, for him to go to meals and back from meals, to go to 
church and back from school—all day long the bell! What does 
that mean? It means that someone else is planning his life for him, 
that someone else is doing his thinking for him. The graduate of 
the orphan asylum lacks initiative. He does not know how to 
spend or to save money. He has no knowledge of human life or 
human nature and when the time comes, as it must come, for him 
to take his place in society, he is at a disadvantage. 

In some orphan asylums we find children with shaven heads and 
uniform clothing marching listlessly in long lines, eating an endless 
repetition of a prescribed dietary served in thick dishes, with iron 
cups and repulsive oilcloth table covers and uncomfortable benches. 
In such institutions life is barren, inhuman, and abnormal. It is 
not surprising to learn that many of their graduates fail to 
succeed. 

The best orphan asylums have long recognized this evil and have 
sought to overcome it. Such institutions as the Chicago Orphan 
Asylum, the Rose Orphan Asylum at Terre Haute, Indiana, the 
Protestant Orphan Asylum at Cleveland, the Rochester Orphan 
Asylum, the New York Orphanage at Hastings-on-Hudson, New 
York, and the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society at Pleasantville, 
New York, are seeking to adapt their work to the personal needs 
and development of their pupils. They reproduce, as far as possible, 
the conditions of family life. They teach the children the use of 
money. They keep them in touch with their friends out in the 
world. They give them efficient training in the school of letters 


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and the vocational school, and they watch over their children with 
fostering care after they leave the institution. 

There are still many superintendents of the old-fashioned type 
and the lives of their children are artificial, unnatural, and some- 
times unhappy; but there are many of an entirely new spirit, like 
the superintendent of the Cleveland Orphan Asylum, himself an 
orphan boy, who has a keen realization of the feelings and the needs 
of his children; or like the superintendent of the New York Orphan- 
age, an eminent educator, who creates for his children an atmosphere 
of love and joyous living. He weaves the whole life of the child 
into his education and makes school life a daily festival. He pays 
his children wages, teaches them to spend, to give, and to save, and 
finds ways by which their lives may expand according to their 
natural endowments. His whole life is an expression of the father- 
hood of which his wards have unfortunately been deprived. We 
have orphanages like the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Asylum where 
the children are divided into families, each family in its own cottage 
with its kitchen, living room, and a group of older people. In this 
asylum the neglected children from the Ghetto of New York, 
coming from homes of wretchedness, have developed the spirit of 
hope and courage and aspiration. These children who would never 
have entered the doors of a high school, pass the examinations of 
the State Board of Regents and graduate from the high school in 
nine years from their entrance into the primary school, receiving, 
at the same time, a more thorough vocational education than is 
given in any other school with which I am acquainted. 

These orphanages and others of similar spirit are slowly revolu- 
tionizing the institutional work of the United States. Unfortu- 
nately institutions of this type are as yet comparatively few in 
number. 

In the twentieth century orphan asylum the superintendent is 
a@ man or woman of culture, with the instincts of a high-grade school 
teacher. The children live in cottages containing from 12 to 30 
children. Each cottage has its own kitchen, dining room, and 
living room, with a housemother who is in close personal touch and 
sympathy with the members of her family. The dining room, the 
kitchen, and the living room resemble as closely as possible those 
of an ordinary family. There is a carefully chosen library supplied 


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not only with books but with games. The children give parties 
to the children of other cottages, keep pets, build rabbit hutches 
and playhouses, earn a little money and learn to spend it. 
The children either attend a good public school or have schools of 
their own which are equal in their curriculum and instruction to 
those of the best public schools. They are instructed in some prac- 
tical vocation, and when they leave the orphanage, remain under 
the friendly watch-care of its officers until they are fairly established 
in life. 
HOME LIFE FOR DEPENDENT CHILDREN 

On the other hand, the influence of the spiritual movement in 
the care of the dependent child is doing away with orphanages. 
The building of such institutions has been checked. In Massa- 
chusetts and Indiana many orphan asylums and children’s homes 
have been closed and have gone out of business. Home life for 
orphan and dependent children is secured by placing them in care- 
fully selected family homes. This method is widely prevalent 
throughout the United States. It has been especially developed 
in states like Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Iowa. 
In some states, as in Michigan and Minnesota, state schools for 
children have been provided from which they are distributed, after 
a brief stay, to carefully chosen family homes. 

The evils of institutionalism are realized not only by social stu- 
dents but by many institution people. In 1909 there was held in 
the city of Washington a remarkable conference to which were 
invited 200 delegates representing every state in the Union and 
every form of work for neglected children. At that meeting there 
was unanimously adopted a significant platform, which began as 
follows: 

‘“‘Home life is the highest and finest product of civilization. It 
is the great molding force of mind and of character. Children 
should not be deprived of it except for urgent and compelling 
reasons. Children of parents of worthy character, suffering from 
temporary misfortune and children of reasonably efficient and de- 
serving mothers who are without the support of the normal bread- 
winner, should, as a rule, be kept with their parents, such aid being 
given as may be necessary to maintain suitable homes for the rearing 
of the children. This aid should be given by such methods and 


14 


from such sources as may be determined by the general relief policy 
of each community, preferably in the form of private charity, rather 
than of public relief. Except in unusual circumstances, the home 
should not be broken up for reasons of poverty, but only for con- 
siderations of inefficiency or immorality.’’ 

The fact that this resolution was unanimously adopted in a 
conference including many representatives of orphan asylums, 
children’s homes, and other institutions, makes the action exceed- 
ingly significant. It was a united declaration of the friends of 
dependent children in favor of the family home as the natural and 
preferable abiding place for the dependent child. It was an em- 
phatic recognition of the sacredness of family life and of a new un- 
willingness to separate children from their parents simply because 
of poverty. 

The spirit of this declaration has found expression in the passage 
in many states, during the past five years, of mothers’ pension laws, 
which are intended to obviate any necessity or excuse for separating 
good mothers from their children. These laws are crude and im- 
perfect, as yet, but they stand for a principle which commands the 
assent of every lover of childhood and of family life. 


ORGANIZATION FOR PLACING-OUT CHILDREN 


The placing of children in family homes is now carried on by 
special organizations. In the larger cities of the east there have 
been established children’s aid societies, some of which have become 
great organizations. Boston has five such societies. In New York 
the Children’s Aid Society expends about $500,000 per year. The 
Children’s Aid Society of Pennsylvania expends about $200,000 
per year. The Illinois Children’s Home and Aid Society expends 
about $100,000 per year. In the city of New York the Catholic 
Home Bureau acts as a clearing house for about 20 orphanages, 
from which it takes children to be placed in selected family homes, 
and in New Jersey the Catholic Children’s Aid Society does similar 
work for some 10 Catholic orphan asylums. In 30 states there 
have been organized state societies known as children’s home 
societies, which are devoted to the work of placing children in family 
homes. Most of the children’s aid and children’s home societies 


15 


are inspired by a lofty social spirit, with a clear recognition of the 
responsibility of assuming to direct the life of a homeless child. 

Multitudes of children are thus cared for without any formal 
organization. There is only one such society for the placing-out 
of colored children in family homes, the Kentucky Colored Children’s 
Home Society, but at the White House Conference in Washington 
in 1909 Dr. Booker T. Washington said: 

“The negro, in some way, has inherited and has had trained into 
him the idea that he must take care of his own dependents, and he 
does it to a greater degree than is true, perhaps, of any other race 
in the same relative stage of civilization. . . . I do not know 
of any case in my own experience where the parents of children have 
died but that within a few hours, almost before the breath has 
passed from the body of the parent, one neighbor, sometimes two, 
three, and sometimes half a dozen have appeared on the scene and 
begged the privilege of taking this child and that child into their 
own families. ’’* 

With this movement toward a normal life and education for 
dependent children has come a new realization of the responsibility 
which is involved in undertaking to control the lives of children. 
Formerly, as we have noted, it was thought that almost anyone of 
benevolent impulse and kindly disposition would do to care for 
dependent children. Today we are searching up and down the 
land to find men and women of character, education, training, and 
consecration for this work, and we are laying it upon them as a 
sacred calling and responsibility, to be accepted only in the spirit 
of the highest consecration and the most diligent study of the needs 
of the child. 

Such notable men and women as Hon. Homer Folks and Dr. R. 
R. Reeder of New York; Miss Frances G. Curtis, Charles W. Birt- 
well, and C. C. Carstens of Boston; Mrs. Martha P. Falconer and 
KE. D. Solenberger of Philadelphia; Miss Julia C. Lathrop of Wash- 
ington; ShermanC. Kingsley of Chicago; C. V. Williams of Columbus, 
and Marcus C. Fagg of Jacksonville, Florida, are bringing to this 
field the conscientious intelligence and devotion which secure the 
highest success in other fields of human effort, and behind them is 
growing up an army of men and women of like spirit. 

Under the influence of this uplifting spirit, multitudes of children 

* Proceedings of the White House Conference, page 115. 


16 


whose lives would have been blighted, have had opened up to them 
opportunities for expansion and development and have measured 
up well with the children of happier fortunes in the community. 


THE OHIO CHILDREN’S CODE 


The interests of childhood have suffered greatly for lack of com- 
prehensive plans of child welfare. It has been left to accident or to 
the caprice of will makers, societies, and legislatures to decide what 
classes of children shall be cared for and what neglected. 

The state of Ohio was the first state in the Union to recognize 
and meet this need. The general assembly, in 1913, enacted a 
“Children’s Code”? which undertook to unify and harmonize all 
state legislation relating to dependent, defective, and delinquent 
children and to coérdinate all of the child welfare agencies of the 
state, public and private. This code covers the juvenile court and 
probation laws; the care of orphans and dependent children; the 
administration of public and private institutions for the dependent, 
neglected, feeble-minded, epileptic, and delinquent children. It 
aims to cover all the needs of children of these classes, to insure 
their protection, and to secure for them such treatment as will 
develop the best that there is in them. 

Under this beneficent code the Board of State Charities has 
established a Children’s Welfare Department. That department 
thus far is an embodiment of the principle which we are discussing; 
it aims to set the spirit above the substance. 


Il. THE DEFECTIVE 


The defective classes include those who suffer from such an 
imperfection of mind or body as disables them from efficient 
participation in the duties of life. These classes include the deaf, 
the blind, the insane, the feeble-minded, the epileptic, the crippled, 
and the incurable. 

In ancient times these unfortunates were either put out of 
existence, or were allowed to perish, or were left to shift for them- 
selves and live a wretched life. Even in modern times our methods 
of dealing with such people were lamentably defective; but with 
the awakening of the new social conscience there came a recognition 
of their right to life and happiness, and of the special obligation 


17 


which rests upon the community in view of their feebleness and 
incapacity. 
THE DEAF AND BLIND 


A hundred years ago the people of the United States began 
building ‘‘asylums”’ for the deaf and dumb and for the blind. The 
word “asylum” implied the claim of the deaf and blind to a refuge 
and to the permanent fostering care of the community because of 
their misfortune; but in 1838 Superintendent Samuel G. Howe of 
Perkins Institute for the Blind in Boston sounded a new note. He 
made the public declaration that the blind were not to be regarded 
as permanent wards of the state but that they were to be educated 
and trained in order that they might become as far as practicable 
useful and self-supporting members of the community, and he 
made the surprising announcement that about 60 per cent of the 
pupils of the Perkins Institute were being educated so as to become 
practically self-supporting. From that day forward the schools 
for the deaf and the blind refused to be classed as charitable institu- 
tions. We no longer build asylums, we build schools for the deaf 
and blind. 

While only a portion of the blind become capable of independent 
self-support, the deaf children who enjoy the advantages of special 
schools and educational training almost invariably become self- 
supporting. It is a rare thing to find a deaf person of normal 
mind in a prison or an almshouse. 


THE CRIPPLE 


This fine conception of the possibility of an active, independent 
life, even for those who are handicapped, is being applied to crippled 
children. It has long been possible for a portion of the crippled 
children in great cities to obtain surgical treatment in general 
hospitals. In 1863 the Hospital for the Ruptured and Crippled 
was established in the city of New York. Similar hospitals have 
been established in the larger cities of the country, and within the 
past 20 years there have been established state hospitals and 
schools for crippled children in Massachusetts, in New York, in 
Minnesota, and in Nebraska, while others are in contemplation; 
and convalescent homes for crippled children have been established 
wn the suburbs of various cities. 


18 


In these hospitals and convalescent homes crippled children are 
encouraged to expect that through surgical treatment and skilful 
nursing they may be so far restored as to become active, self- 
supporting members of the community. The response of these 
little people has been startling. In all of these institutions there 
is found a spirit of courage and hopefulness that is amazing. By 
them multitudes of men and women have been enabled to take 
their place in society where, although they may be handicapped 
by lameness or the loss of members, they gallantly and uncom- 
plainingly take their share of the burden of life. They are a 
standing example of courage, hope, and achievement, and a standing 
rebuke to pessimism and discouragement. 

The outlook for the feeble-minded, the epileptic, and the insane 
is less hopeful than for the deaf, the blind, and the crippled; but 
the application of the spiritual method is already achieving wonders 
even for these who have been deemed hopeless. 


THE FEEBLE-MINDED 


In former generations the feeble-minded as a class received no 
consideration from the community. Those who were favored 
with good homes of their own received the care of their parents 
and friends. By a divine law of compensation the mother often 
seems to have a closer bond of affection for the defective child 
because of his misfortune. But the greater number of the feeble- 
minded are children of mothers who themselves are defective and 
are incapable of giving to their children the watch-care and the 
special training which their sad condition demands. The poor 
children suffered much from the thoughtlessness, often amounting 
to cruelty, of the people about them. The idiot, the “dummy,”’ 
the ‘‘fool,’ were the butt of ridicule. The feeble-minded child 
was punished by the teacher because he did not learn his lesson 
and was made to wear the dunce cap or sit upon the dunce block 
because of his infirmity. | 

A little girl of six or eight years of age is an object of special 
regard to every right-minded man. If anyone offers her an insult 
or affront the whole community rises to her protection. Any 
normal man, even though he may himself be a man of unworthy 
character, will stand ready to sacrifice his life, if necessary, in her 
defense. He recognizes that her innocence, her helplessness, and 


19 


her confiding nature give her an extraordinary claim upon his 
chivalrous regard. 

The feeble-minded girl of fifteen, sixteen, or eighteen years is, 
in body, a woman, with the instincts and dangers of womanhood, 
but in mind she is a child—no more responsible than her younger 
sister of six or eight years. She is innocent, gentle, affectionate, 
confiding. She believes everything that is said to her. If any 
man tells her that she is the prettiest girl in town she believes him. 
If he says that he will find her a situation at $10 a week, she follows 
him with simple confidence. 

This larger child is entitled to the same chivalrous protection 
which is given to her little sister. She is entitled to more, because 
of the additional exposure which is due to her larger growth. 

What happens to this innocent, helpless, confiding girl? She is 
pursued by thoughtless and evil men and is hunted like a rabbit. 
She is ruthlessly destroyed without regard to her helplessness. 
When she goes astray, we send her to a reformatory where she is 
treated as a responsible being. She is admonished, exhorted, 
disciplined, punished, prayed over. She is paroled and sent out 
into a home on trial, but is returned because she is inefficient. 
Finally she is discharged, because the law does not permit her 
retention or because the institution is overcrowded. She goes 
back to the same environment from which she originally came, and 
soon falls a victim to the same influences which caused her original 
downfall. She is branded as an incorrigible, a repeater, and an 
enemy to society. She is cast out and despised by reputable women. 
She is sent time after time to the jail or the house of correction. 

This unfortunate girl takes a frightful revenge upon the com- 
munity which has first neglected and then rejected her. She 
becomes a source of corruption and disease to scores of young 
men and she bears children, one after another, who inherit her 
infirmities and entail similar afflictions. 

It is only six years since the first systematic effort was made to 
ascertain the mental condition of inmates of juvenile reformatories. 
Miss Mary Dewson and Mrs. Glendower Evans of Massachusetts 
made a study of about 1,200 girls who had passed through the 
Massachusetts State Industrial School for Girls. This study in- 
dicated that about 28 per cent of these girls were mentally defective. 


20 


Since that time similar studies have been made in other reformatory 
institutions for boys and girls. As a result it is estimated that 
from 20 to 50 per cent of the inmates of such institutions are really 
feeble-minded; that is, they have not sufficient mental equipment 
to enable them to earn their own living, direct their own lives, and 
resist the ordinary temptations of life. Studies have also been 
made of the family histories of many feeble-minded in different 
states of the Union. As a result of these studies it is agreed that 
a very large proportion of the feeble-mindedness is hereditary and 
that a large proportion of the feeble-minded girls of the com- 
munity become mothers of illegitimate children—not necessarily 
because of deliberate viciousness, but because they have not 
sufficient intelligence and will power to protect themselves. 

The folly and waste of the present system is apparent when we 
recognize that these same young women who now overcrowd our 
reformatories and prisons and go forth to become prostitutes or to 
multiply the race of feeble-minded children, may easily be made a 
wholesome and happy element in the community. In a properly 
ordered institution these girls are gentle, obedient, amiable, religious, 
helpful, and joyous. Their lives are brightened by simple pleasures 
and they cheerfully render helpful service. Many of them can 
be made entirely self-supporting in an institution, under direction, 
and all of them can be fully protected from the dangers that would 
destroy them if they were turned loose in society. This is not a 
matter of theory but has been completely demonstrated by ex- 
perience. 

When the care of the feeble-minded was first undertaken by the 
state of Massachusetts in 1848 the mistake was made of supposing 
that the feeble-minded child was an undeveloped child, and that 
by the use of special methods of instruction by teachers of unusual 
skill and patience the latent powers of the child might be developed 
to such a point that he would be able to take his share in the battle 
of life and to protect himself against evil. Following this view 
there were built schools for feeble-minded children, into which 
young children were gathered for education. Experience has 
demonstrated and science has confirmed the fact that children 
who are truly feeble-minded, that is, those who suffer from a 
disease of the brain or nervous system dating from birth or early 


21 


childhood, have an absolute limitation as to their possible mental 
development which can not be overcome, and that these children, 
unlike the deaf and the blind, can never be educated to the point 
of intelligent and independent self-support; but that, unless they 
have relatives who are able to care for them properly, they must 
be kept under permanent care, in order to protect them from harm 
and in order to prevent them from becoming a source of evil in the 
community. Otherwise a very large share of them must, of 
necessity, become criminals, paupers, or immoral persons. 

To those who are not acquainted with them, feeble-minded 
children seem repulsive and uninteresting, but it is amazing to see 
the affection which conscientious and kindly caretakers develop 
for these poor children. The care of the older feeble-minded is 
not only a matter of kindness and obligation, but it is a matter 
of public economy. It is only by their care that the springs of 
pauperism, vice, and crime which now flow freely from them can be 
checked, and through such care multitudes who are now unpro- 
ductive and are a helpless burden upon the community can be 
made to be largely self-supporting through farm work and other 
industries, while at the same time their happiness and comfort 
can be greatly increased. 

While the feeble-minded are incapable of a high degree of in- 
tellectual development, they are capable of developing spiritual 
qualities of love, kindness, helpfulness, and joyful living. To a 
large degree the cruelty of our neglect of these unfortunates in the 
past is seen in the fact that those who are capable of happiness 
have been consigned to misery. 


THE EPILEPTIC 


The new spirit of philanthropy has reached out to a class of 
defectives who are, perhaps, the most unfortunate and miserable 
of any—the epileptics. Until the year 1893 when the state of 
Ohio built the first institution for epileptics in the United States 
at Gallipolis, there was no institution for epileptics in the United 
States though many epileptics were found in hospitals for the 
insane, in institutions for the feeble-minded, and in almshouses. 
Their presence in such institutions is a hardship to the epileptics 
because many of them are neither insane nor feeble-minded, but 
it is a greater hardship to the proper inmates of these places who 


22 


are shocked and frightened by the epileptic seizures, and are 
exposed to danger from the acts of violence which are often com- 
mitted by epileptics in their paroxysms. There are now institutions 
for epileptics in New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and 
Virginia. No one knows how many epileptics there are in the 
United States. State institutions in Ohio and New York are 
caring for about 3,000. These are but a fraction of the epileptics 
in those states, but if there were proportional provision for epileptics 
throughout the United States we should be caring for at least 
20,000. 

The disease of epilepsy is very little understood. There is no 
known remedy for it and only a small portion of those afflicted 
recover. The only effective treatment known is wholesome food, 
carefully regulated under the direction of a physician, good care, 
outdoor life, congenial occupation and happy, wholesome living 
conditions. Those who have watched the gradual and progressive 
development of this dread disease, with the decay of the mental 
faculties, gradual loss of self-respect and ambition, the harassing 
dread of seizure, the unhappiness which afflicts the patient and his 
friends, can realize the significance and value of the movement for 
their relief. 

At Sonyea, New York, Gallipolis, Ohio, and Palmer, Massachu- 
setts, these lives which are distressed and miserable in the outside 
world are made comparatively happy. Trained attendants watch 
to prevent accident, wholesome recreation is provided, and self- 
respect is maintained by active labor for their own support. Under 
the care of skilled physicians, the number of recoveries is far beyond 
that in the outside world. 3 

THE INSANE 


The change wrought in the condition of the insane under the 
new social spirit is almost inconceivable. In former generations 
insanity and epilepsy were regarded as visitations of divine wrath 
and forms of demoniacal possession. A superstitious fear of the 
insane was spread through the community (indeed it is not fully 
abated even in our day), vile drugs were concocted and administered 
to insane patients, they were whirled in whirligigs, beaten, chained, 
locked in dungeons. I have myself seen in the cellar of a Kentucky 
asylum for the insane the rings in the wall to which violent insane 


23 


patients were chained. I have seen insane patients in Ohio bedded 
down in straw like animals, locked up in cribs with grated tops, 
strapped down in chairs for many hours at a time. I have seen 
a delicate woman, in charge of a sheriff’s officer, wearing handcuffs 
in a public railway car. I have known insane patients to be beaten 
with broomsticks and to be subjected to torture by brutal attend- 
ants. 

These abominable practices were general until the days of Dr. 
Philippe Pinel, who in 1792 struck off the shackles and strait- 
jackets from insane patients. Very gradually his example was 
followed in one institution after another, and the use of cribs, 
chains, leather muffs, belts, straitjackets and other so-called 
“restraining”? apparatus was abandoned. Locked doors were 
thrown open and patients were allowed to go freely about the 
grounds. The title ‘“‘nurse’”’ was substituted for that of attendant, 
recording the recognition of the fact that the insane patient is 
a sick person to be tenderly cared for rather than a prisoner to be 
guarded. Instead of vast buildings containing 500, 1,000, or 2,000 
patients there were substituted cottages containing 20, 30, or 50 
individuals. Patients who had been locked in cells for many years 
were brought out and given light employment; women who were 
accustomed to tear up their clothing and bedding found vent for 
their destructive tendencies in ravelling out stockings and winding 
into balls the yarn which was reknitted in some other ward. Large 
farms were purchased on which hundreds of patients work cheer- 
fully, like ordinary laborers. In South Dakota the insane patients 
have built extensive concrete buildings in whose creation they 
took great pride. I remember when Superintendent Hurd of the 
Michigan Hospital for Insane at Pontiac showed me a party of 
men engaged in excavating a cellar with wheelbarrows. He said: 
“There seems to be some special relation between an insane person 
and a wheelbarrow. Patients who have been quite violent will 
work quietly and efficiently with a wheelbarrow.’’ An insane 
patient was observed joyously trundling a wheelbarrow upside 
down. A bystander said, ‘‘Why don’t you turn your wheelbarrow 
right side up?”’ ‘‘Oh,” he said, ‘‘I know better than that. If I 
turn it right side up somebody puts something into it right away.” 

Twenty-five years ago it was thought that the abandonment of 


24 


restraints and the creation of normal conditions for the patients 
had produced ideal conditions in the treatment of the insane, but 
under the new social spirit a second revolution hardly less significant 
has occurred in the great improvement of the medical work 
whereby the hospitals for the insane are becoming hospitals in 
fact as wellasin name. In former years the attendants in hospitals 
for insane were men and women of the grade of housemaids and 
farmhands, and were paid accordingly; now training schools for 
nurses have been established in many hospitals for insane with 
courses equivalent to those in hospitals for the sick. Formerly 
the assistant physicians in hospitals for the insane spent a large 
part of their time in writing up detailed case records; now this 
work is done by clerks and stenographers, and the physicians are 
free to do the medical work for which they were appointed. For- 
merly insane patients received hasty and imperfect diagnosis; 
now patients are examined with the utmost care and are given 
efficient medical treatment. Formerly pathological study was 
largely neglected; today it is diligently pursued in many hospitals. 

One of the best examples of the humanizing of the treatment of 
insane is found in the state of Wisconsin where 30 small county 
asylums take the place of the vast institutions which are found in 
other states. These asylums, under the close supervision of the 
state authorities, are kept up to a high point of efficiency, while the 
patients, living in small groups, lead a happier and more normal 
life than is possible in the big institution. They are near their 
friends, they have a large amount of liberty, and have an abundance 
of congenial employment. Wisconsin is the only state in the 
Union where the institutions for the insane are not overcrowded. 
The patients, after receiving a thorough course of treatment ina 
state hospital, are transferred to the county asylums when it is seen 
that they can not be further benefited by medical treatment. 
Thus the state hospitals, being freed from overcrowding, have an 
opportunity to do medical work of the highest order. 

The marvelous improvement in the physical and medical care 
of patients in hospitals for the insane is only a part of the benefit 
wrought by the new social spirit. Thirty years ago Dr. James M. 
Buckley, editor of the Methodist Christian Advocate, urged the 
importance of measures for the prevention of insanity. He was only 


25 


a prophet, but within the past ten years his dream has been realized 
in the organization of the National Committee for Mental Hygiene 
which is working actively for the development of measures for 
the prevention of insanity, and to promote early treatment of 
Incipient insanity before the disease becomes firmly established. 


Ill. THE DELINQUENT 


The new conception of the spiritual basis of social work has 
wrought as potently for the delinquent as for the dependent and 
the defective. The delinquent is one who has offended against the 
law and has come to be classed in the public mind as a criminal. 
The application of the spiritual principle to our dealings with the 
criminal is not a new idea. From the day when Jesus said to the 
thief on the cross, ‘‘This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise,” 
the idea of redemption and forgiveness has always found advocates. 

The spiritual principle has been applied, as we shall see, to a 
considerable degree for many years in dealing with juvenile crimi- 
nals, but for the most part the dealings of society with the adult 
criminal have been regulated by mechanical and militaristic prin- 
ciples. 

Society makes war upon criminals. The police are organized on 
a basis of force. They are armed with bludgeons, revolvers, and 
handcuffs. They seize offenders by force and drag them to jail 
where they are thrust into steel cages and exposed to public view 
like wild beasts in a menagerie. Detectives follow the militaristic 
method. The ordinary laws of truth and fair dealing are discarded 
and society justifies them in the use of deception, lies, hypocrisy, 
and traps. 

Criminal courts are organized on a militaristic basis. The pro- 
ceedings are: ‘‘The State of Ohio versus John Jones.’”’ The pris- 
oner is placed ‘‘on his defense.’”’ He finds himself in an atmosphere 
of hostility. The judgment of the court is based upon the lex tal- 
ionis—‘‘ An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.” The effort of 
the court is to inflict a penalty commensurate with the supposed 
guilt of the prisoner—to give him his due. And it is considered a 
legitimate part of the proceedings to humiliate the prisoner and to 
inflict upon him as much ignominy and disgrace as possible. 

The militaristic spirit is further exemplified in the holding of 


26 


prisoners for ransom and the imposition of tribute. When a man 
is accused of a crime he is brought before a magistrate. If the 
evidence appears to warrant a formal trial the magistrate commits 
the prisoner to a public jail to await his trial, but with the condition 
that if the prisoner can find a bondsman who will go security for 
$100 or $1,000 or $10,000, the prisoner may go free; but if he can 
not give a bond he must lie in jail for a month or six months or, per- 
haps, a year, until his trial occurs. When the prisoner is convicted 
of a crime, in many cases the judge imposes a fine of $5 or $100 or 
$1,000 or $5,000. If the prisoner has the financial ability to pay 
the fine, he goes absolutely free, even though the fine may be paid 
from the spoils of his criminal conduct. But if the prisoner is 
unable to pay the fine, he is committed to prison for a month or a 
year or five years in default of the payment of the fine. The in- 
justice of this principle is manifest on its statement, yet it prevails 
throughout the United States. 

A little more than a hundred years ago capital punishment pre- 
vailed widely even for minor offenses—even little boys were hanged 
for theft. In our day imprisonment 1s the usual punishment. The 
prisoner is taken by the sheriff, in shackles, in a public conveyance 
to the state penitentiary which is built like a fortress, manned by 
armed guards, and menaced sometimes by Gatling guns. Peni- 
tentiaries were formerly places of doom where cruelty was rife, 
where prisoners had one-half of their head shaved, were clothed 
in shameful stripes, marched in lock-step, tortured, flogged, starved, 
shut up in dungeons of Stygian darkness for petty offenses, bullied 
and tantalized by ignorant guards. They were places of fear in 
which the prisoner feared the officer and the officer feared the 
prisoner. 

In this day the grosser abuses of the state penitentiaries have 
been modified. Physical torture, flogging, dark dungeons, striped 
clothing, have been largely done away with; but even today, in many 
prisons, we have confinement of one or two prisoners in a cell four 
feet wide, seven feet long, and seven feet high, for 12 hours out of 
24 and on Sundays for 20 hours at a stretch. We have the law of 
silence whereby prisoners are tortured by speechlessness. We have 
the practice of slavery whereby the prisoner is forced to unrequited 


27 


toil, while the industries are so idiotically organized that prisoners 
can not even earn their own keep. 

The theory on which this course of action is justified is that the 
terrors of punishment will inspire fear in the heart of the criminal 
and thus deter him and others from wrong-doing, but, in practice, 
the militaristic method arouses a spirit of hatred and revenge. 
Militarism does not produce the fruits of peace either in the deal- 
ings of states with each other or in the dealings of the state with 
individuals. 

But for 50 years past there has been a strong and progressive 
movement toward better things. While many people have favored 
the idea that the prisoner ought to receive a punishment commen- 
surate with his guilt, others have recognized that it is impossible 
for frail humanity to justly measure the guilt of a fellow man and 
that it is impossible to adjust punishment to the needs or the deserts 
of a human soul. Students of penology have recognized that the 
efforts to do this have entirely failed and that in practice the sen- 
tences adjudged and inflicted upon prisoners have borne no rational 
relation to their actual ill deserts. For many years there has 
been a steady accumulation of public sentiment toward the spiritual 
method of dealing with prisoners, until there is now a general recog- 
nition of the fact that it is desirable to restore the prisoner to his 
proper relation to the community. This idea finds expression in 
the nomenclature of institutions for the confinement of delinquents. 
The word “penitentiary” implies an effort to secure the penitence 
of the prisoner. The titles ‘‘Reformatory,” “Reform School,” 
“Industrial School,” “Rescue Home,” “Training School,” “ House 
of Refuge,” ‘House of Mercy,” ‘‘House of the Good Shepherd,”’ 
and other similar names involve the idea of the redemption of the 
individual through spiritual influences. 

In 1823 the New York House of Refuge was established under a 
law whereby children committed to the House became wards of 
the board of trustees, who had authority to send them out as soon 
as they were believed to have been reformed. ‘The House of Refuge 
was in some respects a juvenile prison, but it marked the beginning 
of a new era and the juvenile reformatory idea spread rapidly. In 
1855 the Ohio State Reform School was built at Lancaster. It 
was the first cottage institution in America. The boys were lodged 


28 


in houses, without prison doors or prison bars, containing about 50 
children each. There was no wall or high fence about the place. 
Superintendent Howe recognized the fact that as soon as you build 
a wall around the boy he wants to climb over it, but when the 
doors are set wide open he no longer desires to run away. 

Under this plan the delinquent child is no longer recognized as 
an enemy of the state, to be punished according to the measure of 
his guilt, but as a ward of the state, to be trained, to be educated 
and developed for good citizenship and wholesome and happy 
living. Today we have training schools for delinquent boys where 
they are housed in cottages containing 20 or 30 boys, each cottage 
with its own farm of 40 or 50 acres with a team of horses, a couple 
of cows, calves, chickens, and a dog. We have ‘‘training schools” 
and ‘‘state home schools”’ for girls where they live in small cottages, 
each of which is a complete domestic unit with its own kitchen, 
laundry, dining room, and living room; where the cooking, house- 
keeping, table service, and the family life are made to conform as 
nearly as may be to the standards of the ordinary family home. 
The children in these schools live out of doors as much as possible 
and the effort is to make their lives normal, wholesome, and cheer- 
ful. 

The results of these methods with young delinquents were so 
encouraging that they were gradually extended to older boys. 
The thought occurred to some wise man that if boys ten to sixteen 
years of age could be successfully reached by this natural method 
during a detention which often extended to the age of seventeen or 
eighteen years, it was possible that boys above the age of sixteen 
years might profit by similar methods. Accordingly they were ap- 
plied gradually and with caution in such institutions as the New 
York State Reformatory at Elmira and the Massachusetts State Re- 
formatory at Concord. It was found to the surprise of experienced 
penologists that these human methods which appeal to the spiritual 
side of the young boy are just as applicable and sometimes a little 
more so to the older boy, because the older boy has more sense, 
more experience of life, and more regard for consequences. 

When in 1885 the late Col. Gardner Tufts put the prisoners in the 
reformatory at Concord, Massachusetts, into black suits, named 
their lodging places ‘“‘rooms”’ instead of ‘‘cells,’’ organized them into 


29 


a Young Men’s Christian Association and literary societies con- 
ducted under their own leaders, and instituted baseball contests 
with teams from neighboring towns, penologists stood aghast; but 
today the plan of dealing with prisoners as human beings and 
appealing to their conscience, self-respect, and spiritual instincts, 
has become familiar throughout the country. 


REFORMATORY METHODS IN PRISONS 


While the propriety of such methods with reference to children 
and youth gradually came into recognition, it was generally con- 
ceded that older criminals who were to be considered as hardened 
and fixed in character must be dealt with by sterner and more 
repressive measures; but, within the past few years, there has come 
a recognition of the fact that mature men are open to the same 
motives of hope, aspiration, chivalry, and self-respect which move 
their younger brothers. 

The practicability of this method has been demonstrated in the 
state reformatories of Massachusetts, New York, and New Jersey, 
but within the past four or five years it has been worked out success- 
fully with adult prisoners. It has at last come to be recognized 
that it is bad psychology to cherish the notion that the way to pre- 
pare a criminal for normal and wholesome living after his discharge 
is to make his condition in prison as unnatural and abnormal as 
possible. To clothe him in stripes, to march him in lock-step, to 
enjoin silence, to make him perforce unsocial, is not the way to make 
him a social being. Least of all may we expect to prepare him to 
become a cheerful and co-operative member of society by making 
him as miserable as possible during his incarceration. Cheerful- 
ness breeds cheerfulness, and the way to prepare men for normal 
living outside of prison is to make their lives inside as normal as 
possible. 

The new method has been worked out in three ways: First, by the 
abolition of harsh punishments, the enlargement of privileges, and 
the introduction of a limited amount of self-government in such 
institutions as the Michigan State Prison, the state reformatories 
of Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey, the 
Cleveland City Workhouse, and the District of Columbia Work- 
house; second, by the introduction of the honor system whereby 
individual prisoners who have demonstrated their trustworthiness 


30 


and good will, are given a considerable degree of liberty and oppor- 
tunity. This method is being worked out successfully in such 
institutions as the Ohio State Reformatory at Mansfield, and the 
state prisons of Colorado and Oregon; third, by the plan of self- 
government of the whole body of inmates as at the prisons of Au- 
burn and Sing Sing, New York, where the entire body of prisoners 
are allowed to legislate with reference to minor details of discipline 
and are held responsible for infractions of the rules. 


THE TRANSFORMATION OF SING SING PRISON 


At Sing Sing guards have been taken out of the shops and the 
dining room, and the prisoners march to and from work under cap- 
tains of their own choosing. The prisoners have a court with 
judges of their own election, who impose penalties for infractions 
of the rules. The action of this court is subject to review by offi- 
cers of the prison, but this authority is seldom exercised. When 
it is exercised it is usually to reduce rather than to increase the pen- 
alties. | 

As a result there has been an amazing change in the disposition 
and the discipline of the prisoners. Recently a party of about 100 
men and 400 women visited the prison. They were divided into 
groups of five persons and 100 prisoners were assigned as guides, 
one for each group. The prisoners performed this duty with pro- 
priety and with an evident sense of responsibility. When a prisoner 
took advantage of his enlarged opportunities and escaped a few 
days ago, his fellow prisoners were highly indignant. They called 
a meeting, passed resolutions of protest, and offered a reward of 
$100 for his recapture. 

It is maintained that under these methods a very much larger 
proportion of the prisoners are restored to right living than under 
former methods, but it has long been recognized that the discharged 
prisoner labors under a great handicap, and agencies have been 
established to befriend discharged prisoners and to assist them in 
getting and keeping employment. The oldest of these organizations 
in the United States is the Pennsylvania Prison Association form- 
erly known as the ‘‘Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public 
Prisons.” Efficient organizations of the same class exist in Massa- 
chusetts, New York, and Maryland. Two organizations, the 


ty for the Friendless and the Howard Association, cover inter- 
tave territory in the central states. 


THE JUVENILE COURT 


In 1899 the state of Illinois passed a law known as the Juvenile 
Court Law, which provided that children under the age of sixteen 
should not be recognized as criminals but as wards of the state, 
and that their cases should not be tried in the criminal court but 
in the court of chancery. This law provided for the establishment 
of a probation system whereby children not considered incorrigible 
could be sent back to their homes or placed in foster homes under 
the charge of a probation officer. The law provided that the pro- 
bation officer should be a discreet man or woman, selected with 
special reference to his fitness to deal wisely and successfully with 
such children. 

The juvenile court law came rapidly into favor and juvenile courts 
now exist in most of the states of the Union. 


THE PAROLE SYSTEM 


One of the most hopeful reformatory measures is the release of 
prisoners on parole before the expiration of their sentence. Under 
this plan the prisoner is not released until there is found for him a 
satisfactory situation with some one who knows his record and will 
not discharge him. At the same time a responsible agent is found to 
befriend and guide him. The paroled man is required to conduct 
himself honestly and decently, and to avoid liquor and bad com- 
pany. If he violates the conditions of his parole it is made the duty 
of the agent to return him in order that he may serve out his prison 
sentence. 

ADULT PROBATION 

For generations it has been the practice for judges to exercise 
discretion in cases where they believed that criminals, though tech- 
nically guilty, were not incorrigible, by suspending sentence and 
allowing the prisoner to go at large in the belief that he ought to 
have another chance. Prisoners thus released were not under su- 
pervision and had no one to befriend or guide them. In recent years 
the probation system has been created in Massachusetts, New York, 
Ohio, and other states. Under this plan instead of committing the 
criminal to prison, the judge may allow him to go on probation under 


32 


the watch-care and guidance of a probation officer whose dut 
to befriend and help him and to see that he continues in the patn u: 
rectitude. In this way hundreds of men and women are restored 
to right living without incurring the odium of being sent to prison. 
The probation method is growing in favor. | 


CONCLUSIONS 


The spiritual method of dealing with dependent, defective, and 
delinquent classes has the co-operation and good will of every citi- 
zen who is a lover of his kind. Many are glad to devote their lives 
to social service; many others are able to share in this work by active 
participation in the work of charity organization societies, child- 
helping societies, prisoners’ aid societies, or social settlements. 

It is the privilege of every one to make his own work, whatever 
it may be, a form of social service. The clergyman, the physician, 
and the teacher have always been social workers; but the lawyer — 
who holds to the high ideals of his profession, the merchant and ~~ 
manufacturer who deal with their employes on the high plane of ~~ 
mutual good will and co-operation, the neighbor who is seeking 
opportunity to promote good living and social justice, all of these 
may have a part in the highest forms of social service. 

To a share in this high privilege I invite you all. It is possible for 
each one of you to find a way in which your training and your edu- 
cation, your spirit of courage, enthusiasm, and hope may contribute 
actively toward the improvement of the community. Your town, 
your county, your state can be distinctly a better place to live in 
because you live in it. 


